The Soup Queen

This is a soup that I made one day while trying to clear up leftover vegetables in the fridge. I had half a carrot and some fresh wai san. So I made this soup which I think tastes infinitely better than plain old wai san with pork ribs.  Carrots in soups make soups taste a lot "sweeter".  For this soup, you will need: 1/2 carrot, cut into chunks Fresh wai san, peeled and sliced 2 dried red dates, pitted 300gm of blanched pork bones 1 liter water Bring water in a pot to boil and add in all the ingredients. Boil on high heat for 10 minutes before putting the lid on your pot. Reduce fire to a mere simmer. Simmer soup for 2 hours. Add salt to taste. You must let your soup "sit" and have the flavours develop once your soup is ready. I noticed that if I immediately serve the soup, it won't taste as good. Let it "sit" for 30 minutes or so before serving. The soup is flavourful and of course you must eat up the carro...

Each Sunday I try to find a new herbal recipe to test. I love my Sundays when I lounge at home, listening to the jazz channel and sipping homemade herbal tea while reading. Today I dug out some wolfberries or "kei chi" or goji berries from the fridge. I am usually running out of space in my fridge because all my herbs go into the fridge. In this tropical weather, herbs will either dry out or go mouldy if you keep them too long in the cabinets. One distinct way to know if your wolfberries are deteriorating is to see their bright red colour becoming a dull, dirty red. That's why you know your wolfberries can go into the compost bin! (Or maybe you can stick them into some soil and grow your own goji berry plants. I might try this though finding available space in my already thriving garden can be tough!) This packet of wolfberries is considered Super Grade because each wolfberry is larger than regular itty bitty ones you see in most pre-packed herbal soup packets. My r...

Whenever I see fresh wai san or shan yao or Chinese yam in the market, I'll buy some. As wai san can keep for a few weeks wrapped in paper in the fridge, it is a worthwhile buy. (And you know how I love making wai san soup and wai san congee ). Sometimes, I forget I have wai san sitting in my vegetable compartment and when I finally dig it out, it has gone all mouldy and icky. I am not too sure if I mentioned this but I compost all of my organic matter - from cooked stuff to fish bones and meat bones. A lot of people will only compost vegetable and fruit - I am not too sure why they think fish bones or meat bones or chicken bones won't compost. Maybe they fear the smell of rotting animal matter? As I've been composting using a 10-pot system taught by my friend Don for more than 2 years now, I can tell you that as long as you cover your waste matter with minimum 2 inches of soil, there will be no flies or maggots. Of course bones will not compost easily. It is afte...

First of all, so very sorry for a long hiatus from this blog. I have been extremely busy with my business and that left me very little time for blogging (and you know I have another blog, right?). The thing about business is, after sometime, you need to re-focus and re-strategize because we're no longer interested in what we were in interested in say 7 or 8 years ago. Our focus has changed. That's got a lot to do with experiencing everything that a business puts you through - both good and bad. Anyway. This blog will resume (I found out just this week that a blogger friend had closed her blog for good! Wow. That takes a lot of courage) and I will continue blogging. I am never at loss for topics - usually it is a lack of time! So let's see.... remember my pomegranate tree ? It's still fruiting with wild abandon. Its branches, puny as they look, are heavy with fruits and supporting the rosy orbs. I was really eager to taste the fruit but this is my first time...

I know it's ridiculous to be so happy about a fruit tree but this tree holds a special place in my heart.  I had this tree grow from some leftover pomegranate seeds while I was still living in my old apartment - I think that was sometime in 2009.  I planted the seeds in a plastic pot and forgot about it. You see, my then balcony didn't have much direct sunlight so I barely had any hope that the seeds would germinate. Fighting against all odds (and maybe, just maybe I have green fingers!) the seeds grew into a spindly little plant. Pomegranate leaves are long and tapered, as you can see in the photos below.  I brought this pot over when I moved home in November 2009. This new apartment of mine affords me a little bit of backyard. I promptly transplanted the pomegranate plant into a larger pot made of clay. I figured it would have more space to grow. I placed this pot in the garden, with direct sun and rain.  I kept "feeding" it compost every mont...

It's been a rather busy time for me (but hey, that's life, right?) with our new website product for the business as well as going home to Banting to visit my parents in March. March was also my birthday month where I turned 38. I am 2 years away from the big 40. One of the things which I love about soups is that if you drink soups regularly, your skin won't age that badly even if chronologically you are ageing! (That and a penchant for foot reflexology - I've been going for foot reflexology sessions twice a month and I believe that helps with preserving good health too!) Speaking of which, my friends from France who came to visit Nic and I two weeks ago (after their conference in Singapore) were rather intrigued by all this health and wellness they seemed to see everywhere in Penang. When we were going to a restaurant for lunch, we walked past a health and wellness exhibition. "Health is really a big deal here," Hugh commented. I never really gave t...

This is yet another easy dessert recipe for women. The combination of these two main ingredients, lotus seeds and dried lily bulbs, is better than any skincare. Drinking this regularly - say once a week - is touted to improve your skin texture and promote cell regeneration. It's really easy if you have a slow cooker. Just put the ingredients in, switch the cooker on, let it simmer for an hour and you'll have a deliciously light and sweet dessert to drink before you turn in for the night. Remember to soak the lotus seeds to soften first, then crack them open and remove the green (bitter) pith beforehand. If you can get fresh lotus seeds (the kind that is sold vacuum-packed), you don't have to soak the seeds. Lotus Seed & Lily Bulb Dessert 19 gm dried lily bulbs 38 gm dried lotus seeds (soaked and pith removed) 2 cups water some rock sugar to taste Place all ingredients into a slow cooker or crockpot. Simmer for an hour. Serve warm. Here's to beau...

Chinese people love eating parts of the pig. Apparently each part of the pig corresponds to the parts in us humans. So if you want to strengthen your legs, eating pig trotters are the way to go. Or if you want to become smarter, you go for the pig's brain (and we all thought pigs are stupid creatures!). When I was in my teens and studying for major exams, my mom would specially order a whole brain of the pig from the pork butcher. She would then boil the brain with some herbs in a slow cooker and I'd take that, soup, brain and all. This was to ensure my brain got all the nutrients it needed to perform well under stress. I do know now that consuming the innards and organs and yes, the brain of the poor pig, does increase one's cholesterol level. However, at that age (remember I was in my teens), I'd imbibe the stuff my mom cooked because they were delicious in a morbid way. I'd always feel a bit like Supergirl after taking these soups. Pig's brain, when ...

I was riffling through my recipe book last night when I saw this recipe. I am not sure where I got it from since I normally copy recipes, stick them to my fridge as a reminder to try the recipes out. Nourishing goodness for the eyes, blood and Qi I figured I should try this one out as it has a host of benefits. This dessert soup comprising dried longan, dried red dates and kei chi or goji berries helps with: replenishing vital energy or Qi promotes blood improves eye sight All you need are a handful of dried longan, about 8 dried red dates and a tablespoon of goji berries (soaked in water for a bit). Add these ingredients to a pot of water (about 1 liter). Add enough rock sugar (depends how sweet you like your dessert soup).  Bring to a rolling boil. Then cover and lower fire so that the dessert merely simmers. Simmer it for 35 minutes or so. Serve warm.  Great to be taken just before bed time! Warm of course. Not cold.  This recipe ma...

I have this climbing creeper plant called Clitoria Ternetea or Butterfly Pea Flower or Bunga Telang (in Malay) in my garden for many reasons. This blue flower is one of my favourite flowers of all. Its intense indigo makes me happy (I have always loved strongly coloured fruits and flowers...I don't know why). Clitoria ternetea flowers  One, you add precious nutrients into the soil when you plant this on the ground. Two, the flowers are used to colour food naturally. The blue Nyonya kuih made with glutinous rice was in the olden days coloured with pounded juice from this pea flower (I sometimes wonder if they use blue dye these days!). Even "Nyonya zhang" or the Chinese dumpling can be coloured with this blue flower.  Third, the flower can be made into a drink that's full of antioxidants. Fourth, you can use the blue flowers to dye your hair (haven't tried this yet). As a drink, I just pluck about 5 to 8 fresh flowers and steep w...

I came across this post on Persicaria capitata and it seems this weed is really a herb. In many ways, I have often pondered on the fact- when is a weed a weed and when is it a herb? Even certain grasses function as herbs for cats. My cat loves to chew on grass when she's feeling a bit under the weather. In the past, we used to bring home grass for her (we used to live in an apartment where grass was scarce!) and she was too scaredy to go down to the park to chew some grass, well at least the kind cats can use for stomach problems.  Now Margaret has all the grass she can chew. We're still living in an apartment but it's on the ground floor and we have a tiny backyard where we grow quite a bit of herbs and stuff. The grass, all types, are plentiful. It's a veritable buffet. With grass, comes weeds.  What really are weeds anyway?  Weeds are just a name we give to plants which we feel we have no proper use for. To Margaret, grass is a herb. If we huma...

Happy New Year folks! I have been so busy with business in between planning out stuff for this year that I've been quite guilty of not updating fast enough. Anyway, since this is the week before Chinese New Year, I'm going to be good and share some interesting dessert soup recipes. OK, onwards to this dessert made with two nourishing ingredients, pumpkin and barley. I had this as a drink recently when I was lunching with a good friend at a macrobiotic cafe. I enjoyed the taste very much and decided to replicate it at home. Pumpkin barley dessert - so nutritious and easy to make Pumpkin is one of my favourite vegetables but Nic doesn't like it much (especially cooked as a dish for dinner). But I do know that pumpkin is good for health and I try to incorporate it as much as I can into our food. Buying pumpkin whole is always better than buying halves but how else can you have pumpkin besides stir-fried with garlic? Hence this recipe! (Also I make pumpkin man...

I got an email from Leslie this week who wrote: Hi! I wrote you a message last week about a Chinese Women's health soup with adzuki beans, black sugar, red wild rice, dates, peanuts and goji berries. Do you know this recipe and the amounts and when is the best time to eat it? Personally I have not come across this recipe before. Anyone here has heard about this soup or even eaten or cooked this before? Although I have not cooked it before, the rule about eating or drinking Chinese soups is that you MUST drink them warm and on the day you cook/brew it. Freshness is paramount in Chinese cooking (hence, fish must still be alive and jumping in aquariums before it is cooked etc. though I feel that is a terrible fate for the poor fish!). That idiosyncrasy of the Chinese aside, soups can be drunk any time of the day though if it is a nourishing soup, it may be drunk an hour or two before you go to bed (such as Dang Gui soup). If you have encountered this soup before, I would a...

Introduction to Chinese Herbs published by herbal company, Eu Yan Sang While shopping for herbs for my Mom-in-Law a few weeks ago at the Eu Yan Sang outlet near my home, I saw this book on Chinese herbs. Priced at RM38, the book is published by Eu Yan Sang and contains an introduction to Chinese herbs and their origins, pinpointing their location in China. I told myself that I was there to buy herbs for my Mom-in-Law so I thought I'd buy this book the next time. I have quite a few books on Chinese TCM herbs but I still love collecting these books. Even in today's Internet age where I can easily google and find out about a specific herb, nothing beats browsing a real book. I also realized why I need to quickly learn how to read in Chinese - many books on TCM herbs are still largely in Chinese (as I found out when I was at Popular Bookstore). I found myself annoyed that I could not understand 80% of what was written in these Taiwanese and Chinese books. (In case you...

I tend to poke about the kitchen a lot more on weekends. Sweet red bean dessert with dried longan and rock sugar Cooking is my therapy. It gets me away from computers and the Internet for two days. Today, I made some red bean dessert for tea. Yes, for tea. We Chinese like our desserts for those in-between meal times. Actually you could drink/slurp this dessert any time of the day. For me, it just so happened that the dessert was ready around 4pm and tea it was. Red beans or adzuki beans are commonly used in Asian food. In Chinese cuisine, red beans are normally eaten in sweet form, but I have eaten it as a soup, a savoury version when my Mom-in-law boiled it as a soup with pork bones. Nic was aghast at the taste but like a dutiful son, he drank up the soup though he did tell me privately that it was rather weird to have a savoury red bean soup. I thought so too. All my life, I've grown up drinking a sweet red bean dessert so savoury red beans do taste odd! Red be...

I got this question today in my email. A reader emailed me to ask for the "wan tan" or "won ton" soup. Please help me with the recipe for the broth (only) for won ton soup. Every Chinese reataurant makes it and has the same taste which I am addicted to. Tried with plain chicken broth and added garlic powder, celery, some soy sauce and green onion, perhaps some white wine and sesame oil but not the same. Can you help? Here's my answer: I've tasted the Malaysian versions of wan tan soup, not the American Chinese restaurant version. So my answer and reply to this reader is based on what I have tasted. I recently watched a TV programme where I learnt how wan tan soup is made. They used "ikan bilis" or dried anchovies as well as dried red dates. I am not sure if they added chicken bones or meat bones but it is OK to do so as this adds to the 'sweetness' of the soup. Please do not be mistaken about 'sweetness'. Sweetness...

I've been schooled to replenish my blood each month after my menses. This is something drilled into me since I was young, about 12 or 13. It also helped that my sisters and I were often fed with soups and tonics since young so making blood tonics isn't something new at all. Wonderful and nourishing Dang Gui tonic for women. Recommended to be taken  often. When I went away to study in university, I rarely had chance to make these nourishing soups for myself. We couldn't cook in our dorm rooms - the hazard of fire was very real. When I moved out of the dorm and into a student house (located out of campus), my dad bought me a Pensonic slow cooker so I could make soups on my own. That was about 15 years ago. That Pensonic slow cooker is still with me and yes, it still works! The slow cooker is rather small and only makes up to 2 bowls of soup. But back then it was sufficient. After all I was only making soups for myself. The best thing about using a slow cooker ...

This is an updated post where I've added more information and photos. Sometimes it's a revelation to know that certain herbs I thought to be Chinese actually has been in use in the Western world for a long time too. Self Heal or Prunella Vulgaris - a great liver tonic! One particular herb called Self Heal or Prunella Vulgaris is just that. I grew up with this herb. Mom used to make Xia Ku Chao tea (a dark tea which looks just like Lo Han Guo tea ) for us when we were little. It helped to cool down the body. And Xia Ku Chao or Self Heal (flower spikes) is cheap and plentiful. With RM1, you could buy a fairly large packet. Just put this dried herb into a pot of water and boil away. Add rock sugar and you can drink it the whole day. For a robust taste, substitute with brown cane sugar. For a pot of 1.5 liter water, I add about 1 to 2 pieces of the brown candy sugar. Brown candy sugar is made from sugar cane juice. Available at all Chinese shops and herbalist...

My friend, Jo, asked me this question about making watercress soup. She says that her watercress soup turned out bitter. When it comes out bitter, it is really a waste of time and money (and appetite too) as no one will touch the soup. UPDATE: Alan Bergo left me an interesting comment about bitter watercress. Please see his comment below this post.  Naturally I have come across this "bitter watercress soup" puzzle once. Yes, even I - I who profess to know my soups. Actually I am still learning. I am curious about soups and so this question by Jo niggled me to no end. Many years ago, I made a pot of watercress soup and strangely, it didn't taste good at all. It had hints of bitterness. I never really got around to investigating why until Jo asked me this question again. Now that I am a lot better at making Chinese soups, I started to think of whom I could ask. Two people come to mind. The woman who sells vegetables at the market. She's a friendly matronl...

I made this soup a few times already and I really like the combination of two types of beans in the soup. Their textures are completely different and that is what makes this soup a true winner. I usually get fresh pinto beans in pods when I go to the market. Peeling them is Nic's job although it isn't really that hard to peel them. They're beige beans speckled with red dots. My vegetable seller tells me these beans are great for soups as they're nourishing. Pinto in Spanish means "painted". A quick search on pinto beans turns up wonderful information. You can find out more about the nutritional profile of these beans here and here . As for black soya beans, I use the dried variety which I get from my sundry goods store in the market. Before you use them, you have to dry fry them in a pan until their black skins crack open to reveal their green insides. Black soya beans contain antioxidants and are deemed high in Vitamin E content. They are also anti...